After gaining back more than 50 pounds, it's time to try and take them off again this year. Last weekend's Sunday Times (UK) had an article in the Style Magazine on intermittent fasting and when I saw their recommended diet with 500 calorie "fast" days it brought me back to JUDDD again. I gave it up last year because every weekend became two Up Up And Away Days - I think one was over 5000 calories - and I really couldn't control it. I've done a lot of reading about strategies to deal with my food issues and think I have a better understanding of how to cope now.

Another problem I've had is that when I lost the weight I did a LOT of exercise - cardio AND circuit training seven days a week. I ended up hating it. I want to find out what I can do with just eating and limited exercise (walking a few times per week with a knee brace). I spent so much time in pain from my knee and hip when I tried to do all the workouts that I'm thinking of ordering DVDs for something like Callanetics or T-Tapp that I hope would provide toning without the pain. But first the food side of things.

So. I went to the calculator, got my numbers (at 25%), and rounded them off. Added up seven up days and seven down days and divided by two which gave me 7000 calories per week. Since I will lose on 1000 calories a day that's good. Then I portioned them out to work around my "issues" - basically my dh and his wine - and came up with the following plan:

All you can do is give it a try Cammie. It looks good to me. The only thing I wonder about is that you're not getting a full 1000 calorie difference between most UDs and DDs, but you're close. I don't know if that will cause the sirtuins to build more slowly or not.

Give it a couple of weeks and see how you're losing. If you need to tweak a bit, you can go from there. Good luck!

I'm back at JUDDD too after regaining all but two pounds I had lost a couple of years ago. In retrospect, my problems mostly stemmed from not counting my UD calories, and trying to do set days rather than follow the UD/DD rotation. Everyone is different - but for me, a MD and UD in a row soon became two UDs, and they soon became two UUAADs. After two UUAADs, the DDs were terribly difficult since all sorts of craving monsters were awakened. And, I found that the lowest calorie calculation for weight loss resulted in me feeling lightheaded at times on DDs. I went for months without losing anything, no doubt because my extra UD (supposed to be MD) per week put me into maintenance rather than weight-loss mode.

This time I'm keeping my calories on the upper end of the scale, and counting every calorie. I've been losing at a rate that is astonishing to me, because I've always been a really slow loser. That may need to change as I take off more weight, but I'll worry about that if and when things stall.

Why wouldn't you just use your calculated UD cals for your UD and simply count them and stick to them? JUDDDD (or 5:2) works with little or no exercise, especially if you have more to lose.

If 1000 cals is your average per day, there is a chance you may not be getting enough nutrition to simply fuel your body which will ultimately slow your metabolism. One of the reasons JUDD doesn't slow your metabolism is that you are stoking the fires every other day (the studies show that it takes 4 days or more of low cal eating to begin the metabolism slowdown...). If you are restricting too much on UD that may be a problem, you will ultimately have real hunger and probably will then binge and "fail".

p.s. I do liberal medium days, so I don't think that is an issue, but my UD are always minumum 1500 cals and range 1500-2300+

Yeah, 1000 calories per day average seems low. Your stats don't say what your current weight is but even if you're close to goal that still seems low.

Why can't you just do straight rotations and do maintenance calories when one of your down days falls on a wine day? You can do a down day up to 50-60% of your up day calories and still be on plan. So do 1600 up days, 300-400 calorie down days, and 800 calorie down days when wine is involved. Make sense?

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"before" from the bad old days.

"Success occurs in clusters and is born in generosity" --Julia Cameron

Seems like it would difficult. Such low UDs will make for extra hungry DDs, I think. In theory it sounds like it would work, but in practice I think it would be hard. But, only you know your own body, so no harm in trying it anyway.

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"Never give up on a dream just because of the length of time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway."

I'm back at JUDDD too after regaining all but two pounds I had lost a couple of years ago. In retrospect, my problems mostly stemmed from not counting my UD calories, and trying to do set days rather than follow the UD/DD rotation. Everyone is different - but for me, a MD and UD in a row soon became two UDs, and they soon became two UUAADs. After two UUAADs, the DDs were terribly difficult since all sorts of craving monsters were awakened. And, I found that the lowest calorie calculation for weight loss resulted in me feeling lightheaded at times on DDs. I went for months without losing anything, no doubt because my extra UD (supposed to be MD) per week put me into maintenance rather than weight-loss mode.

This time I'm keeping my calories on the upper end of the scale, and counting every calorie. I've been losing at a rate that is astonishing to me, because I've always been a really slow loser. That may need to change as I take off more weight, but I'll worry about that if and when things stall.

You're close to my weight, Penguin. Would you mind telling me your UD/DD calories? Do you also exercise? I want to be astonished by my weight loss!

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"Never give up on a dream just because of the length of time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway."

Librarygirl - I do 500-cal or less DDs and 1800-cal UDs. Those numbers are kind of in-between categories on the JUDDD calculator, but seem to be working for me right now. In my previous JUDDDventure, I found that sticking around 350 cals on DDs caused me to feel a little light-headed, and I'm not sure why - no diabetes, and no blood sugar issues I'm aware of. As for astonishment, keep in mind that I am typically a very slow loser, like one pound a month, so losing 13 pounds in just over a month - with the holidays in there - is just mind-boggling to me. I don't exercise, but I do try to get some walking in most days. I hate to exercise

I lost fast at first and I wonder if everyone does at first no matter what WOE? After the first 10 lbs, that's when the struggle begins. I was doing 500 DDs and 1874 UDs and not losing much. Have started lowering DD's hoping it will help. You're doing fantastic!

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"Never give up on a dream just because of the length of time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway."

Yeah, 1000 calories per day average seems low. Your stats don't say what your current weight is but even if you're close to goal that still seems low.

sense?

I am 5'4 and my numbers are 1600/300 which only average 950 per day. This is the problem with being short.
I just want to weigh in and say that this may work, but be prepared to lose slowly. I did something similar during maintenance and as long as I didn't go over 700 on my MD and then rotated, I still lost.

Thanks for the replies! In the last week I lost just over 12 pounds, but that's also in part because of going back to low carb. Most days I didn't get to my calorie target (was reasonably close) but yesterday went over by a couple hundred so it averaged out perfectly. I even ate a bread roll last night, though I don't intend to make a habit of that.

We will have wine on Friday, Saturday and Sunday so none of those can be a true down day (unless I skip food almost entirely). I was also worried about facing into a Monday 400 calorie day having only eaten a medium day of less than 1000 calories. I'll just see how it goes for now.

My age is against me in terms of allowed calories too, so I'm just trying to distribute my calories in a way that will work best for me. I never could manage a true ud/dd rotation so I know that doesn't work for me. And if I do regular dieting of any sort I don't lose on a straight 1200/day since that is so close to my maintenance number.

If I did a true rotation according to the calculator, the 4-up-day week would be 7,600 calories and the 3-down-day week would be 6,400 so my weekly calories are in line with what is recommended for my height/age/weight.

Thank you all for your replies and making me think about it a bit further... I might make a few changes after all!

Just curious, you said that you have to remain at low maintenance numbers because of your age. Are you speaking of lower than 1500? My TDEE is 1644 at age 54. In fact, it is probably a tad more, because I do not sit all day and I do exercise regularly.

Just curious, you said that you have to remain at low maintenance numbers because of your age. Are you speaking of lower than 1500? My TDEE is 1644 at age 54. In fact, it is probably a tad more, because I do not sit all day and I do exercise regularly.

Yes. When I was at goal last year I started gaining when I increased my eating beyond 1350 calories per day (and we're the same age). My lifetime of yoyo dieting is making me pay, I guess!

Well, some people in our age group really struggle with fasting and losing. Don't let this discourage you, because I believe in fasting for certain. I just lose much slower than the average person who does very well with JUDDD.